


Vigil

by WahlBuilder



Category: Mars: War Logs
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Brotherly Bonding, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Implied/Referenced Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-02
Updated: 2019-02-02
Packaged: 2019-10-21 02:13:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 474
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17634074
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WahlBuilder/pseuds/WahlBuilder
Summary: ‘What if they are all dead?’ That’s what Sean says.





	Vigil

‘What if they are all dead?’ That’s what Sean says. He’s sitting on the bed with his knees pulled to his chest, his arms over his legs, and his boots shedding dust and sand, but it’s nothing, because sand gets anywhere anyway. And Sean says, ‘What if they are dead?’

That’s what he says.

Roy doesn’t know what to do. He isn’t sure Sean knows he’s here.

Sean stares into empty space (across kilometres of Mars). And says, ‘I don’t want them to be dead.’ And Sean says, hiding his face behind his hands and knees, ‘But it’s better if they are, because then they are free.’

Roy reaches out to him, but Sean doesn’t like being touched, and Roy doesn’t know how to touch, and doesn’t know what to do. He could pull Sean into a dispute (over freedom and death and family and love and), but he doesn’t know. He doesn’t know. So he asks, ‘Do you need advice or just to vent?’ He asks, ‘May I sit with you?’ He says, ‘I’m here.’

Sean’s hands are so pale against his leather-clad knees. By the look of his hands alone, Roy can say he’s a Technomancer: there is metal gleaming in the tiny wrinkles and grooves, here and there.

It never goes out entirely.

Sean says, ‘Stay.’ Sean says, ‘Please.’

So he stays, crosslegged on the rag by the bed, because Sean didn’t ask him to be closer.

He folds his arms on his lap, a changed reflection of Sean’s: where Sean’s hands are clasped tightly, Roy keeps his relaxed.

‘If all of them are dead,’ Sean says, Sean whispers, ‘let at least _him_ walk free.’

‘Your…’

‘Yes.’

‘It is unfair,’ he tells Sean, ‘to place the burden of your expectations and hopes on him.’

‘Isn’t that what we all do with the younger generations?’

‘It is not fair and not right.’

Sean doesn’t reply.

Roy waits.

‘What I need now,’ Sean says, ‘is a drink.’

He opens a flask and pushes his into Sean’s hands. He waits.

Sean takes a draught from the flask. Sean looks down at him with something like life in his eyes. ‘Water?’

‘Fluid. Drink.’

Sean drinks. Sean says, stroking the grooves on the flask, ‘You should have let me die. I would have died on my own terms.’

‘I would not have killed,’ he tells Sean, ‘those were not _my_ terms.’

‘I lived, and you live, too,’ he tells Sean.

Sean looks away and looks tired. ‘I’m tired,’ Sean says, ‘of not being free.’

He looks at Sean looking away and looking tired. ‘Is that what you are tired of?’

Sean’s hair has grown out. It looks soft.

‘I don’t know,’ Sean says. ‘But I _am_ tired.’

‘Then rest,’ he tells Sean. ‘I’ll be here,’ he tells Sean.

They talk until Sean falls asleep.

Roy stays.


End file.
